Any relationship founded on trust, safety, and commitment needs to be secure functioning. A secure functioning relationship rests on the principle that each partner benefits when the relationship thrives. It emphasises mutual stability and security as the best defence against the stresses, challenges, and vicissitudes of life.

I’ve talked about how secure functioning differs from secure attachment in a previous blog post (read it here if you haven’t already). Today, I’ll dive deeper into what characterises a secure functioning relationship and some of the core principles that set it apart from a non-secure functioning relationship.

If you are currently in a relationship, it might be helpful to assess your relationship against the principles below and identify areas for change or growth. If you are single or dating, the following can help create a framework for future relationships.

1. The relationship comes first

We live in a culture that prioritises individuality above all else, so this principle may seem challenging or controversial. In a secure functioning relationship, each partner feels that they and the relationship come first in their partner’s order of priorities. This includes career, hobbies, children, family, spirituality, social media, alcohol, other addictions and—in this modern age—phones. Furthermore, secure functioning couples drop everything to support each other without question when the situation arises. Partners always come first, never second or third.

This doesn’t mean that partners give up external priorities or that there will never be times when external priorities take precedence. It simply means that external priorities must always be managed with the understanding that the relationship is each other’s highest priority and negotiated as necessary.

2. Partners act with honesty and transparency

This is another potentially confronting principle for our individualistic culture: secure functioning couples have nothing to hide from each other. They do not conceal texts, emails, people they associate with, or other events in their lives. Partners are also always the first to know about all matters of importance; they share everything with each other and are fully transparent.

Openness and honesty are the surest ways to foster a culture of trust in a relationship. Sunlight is the best antiseptic, as the saying goes. When everything is out in the open, suspicion and distrust can’t fester in a relationship’s shadows.

3. Partners are experts on one another

Secure functioning couples possess detailed ‘love maps’: deep understandings of each other’s inner world. Partners are aware of each other’s strengths, weaknesses, and vulnerabilities. They know what makes the other tick and act as their biggest cheerleader and greatest defender.

Partners also understand each other’s neurobiology and emotional range. They are skilled at soothing or arousing each other when they are dysregulated or shut down. They are expert nervous system regulators who know how to prevent conflict from escalating and defuse disagreements, allowing them to move into repair quickly.

Possessed with that deep understanding of each other, secure functioning couples become their partner’s ‘whisperer’, skilled at motivating or persuading each other through seduction and influence without recourse to intimidation, blame, guilt, threat or fear.

4. Partners are attuned to each other’s cues

Attunement is an essential skill that helps partners become each other’s ‘whisperer’. Attunement means that partners are highly attentive to each other’s different emotional states and how they present and can make accurate interpretations regarding their partner’s state based upon what they are observing rather than picking up on the ‘vibe’ or a hunch.

Attunement is necessary for de-escalating conflict because well-attuned partners are less likely to make communication and interpretation errors when feeling heightened.

5. Couples quickly repair relationship ruptures

Couples often tell me that they can take several days to repair a rupture following an argument because it takes that long to feel like they can approach each other again without animosity. The issue with taking so long to repair is that any hurts or injuries partners have experienced because of the rupture will become stored in the brain’s long-term memory. This creates what is known as negative sentiment override, where partners view each other’s interactions using a negative lens.

We may feel reluctant to return to a relational connection with someone we perceive as the source of our hurt; our neurobiology and attachment patterns may require further soothing. However, couples who prioritise relationship security should begin the repair process as soon as possible. Ideally, within the hour. Never longer than a day. This is the best prevention against negative sentiment override. A good rule of thumb is not to go to bed angry at each other. Never sleep with the enemy!

Effective repair involves avoiding blame and taking mutual responsibility for disagreements or ruptures. It is one of the most difficult relationship skills to master, yet critical for security and safety.

6. Partners behave in ways that are fair, just, and sensitive

Equity and fairness in relationships are crucial to generating goodwill or positive sentiment override. As social animals, fairness is hardwired into our nervous system, which is why injustice feels so visceral when it happens. Lingering unfairness in a relationship builds resentment, and when there’s resentment, both partners end up losing.

There are no objective criteria for what’s fair and just. Couples must establish this for themselves and adhere to it. Committing to principles of fairness in a relationship also means that partners commit to addressing imbalances and inequities in the relationship when they arise.

7. Partners equally share power and authority

Equal sharing of power and authority in a relationship goes hand in hand with fairness and equity. On the seas of intimacy, partners are co-captains of their relation-ship. Income, status, gender, age, or any other factor does not give one partner more power or control in the relationship. This doesn’t mean that every decision in the relationship is made together. Instead, secure functioning couples agree on responsibilities and are skilled at delegating. They ensure that major decisions affecting the relationship are collaborative.

8. Partners take active steps to connect with and appreciate each other

Secure functioning couples understand the importance of greetings and departures. They take time to attune and connect when they wake up, when they go to work, when they reunite at the end of the day and before they go to sleep at night. They are never short of appreciation and make meaningful gestures of gratitude and admiration.

Because they are well-attuned to each other’s emotional states, partners know how to offer words or gestures that will touch the other. They look upon each other with softness and fondness and guard against communicating contempt and resentment, knowing that this will undermine the security of the relationship.

9. Partners are experts at finding win/win solutions.

Secure functioning couples are adept at making decisions that benefit both partners. They are expert negotiators who never fight to win or for keeps and understand that if both partners give a little ground or find ways to compromise, then each partner wins.

If one partner wins at the expense of the other, both partners ultimately lose, as feelings of unfairness and inequity will arise.

10. Partners have each other’s back

Knowing partners are there for each other and have each other’s back is a core tenet of relationship security. Even though they know each other’s vulnerabilities, they refuse to exploit them; they never throw each other under the bus. Furthermore, partners never blame, shame, embarrass or belittle each other in public or private, and they do not divulge privileged relationship information without consulting the other. Secure functioning couples never threaten the existence of the relationship.

The understanding that our partner will protect us creates embodied feelings of safety and security, which in turn strengthens the relationship.

Final thoughts

Couples who follow the above principles of secure functioning will create relationships of mutual safety and trust and experience more security, satisfaction and longevity than couples that are not secure functioning.

If you want to learn more about how to make your relationship secure functioning, each out about couples therapy.